


The End

by anonymousCat



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: 'it didn't really happen' au, Coma, M/M, anime ending spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-02
Updated: 2015-04-02
Packaged: 2018-03-20 21:12:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,780
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3665226
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousCat/pseuds/anonymousCat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This wasn't real, this couldn't be real. Hide couldn't really be... No.</p>
<p>In which Kaneki Ken never became a ghoul and it was all in his head, all of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The End

**Author's Note:**

> The ending of the anime really fucked me up. Even more than the manga, so this was my way of coping with that.
> 
> And oh gosh this is my first posting under this account and in this fandom. I'm nervous but also excited. This hasn't been edited yet so things are bound to change at some point when I edit this.  
> Maybe.

_Beep… Beep…Beep…_

He sits there staring down at Hide’s body, he’s long since stopped breathing with that small quirky smile on his face. It hurts to think about how he’ll never see the full thing again, never hear his teasing voice. 

A couple more tears escape and splash down on Hide’s face, he didn’t know what he was going to do now because Hide had been the reason behind so many thing that he did that he didn’t really know what he was going to do without him.

Kaneki chokes on the air that he breaths in, he wants to sob, to completely break down, but he doesn’t have the energy to do that. He just wanted to go back.

_Beep… Beep…Beep…_

He gets up and grabs one of the white table cloths and wraps Hide in it. Nothing’s okay, nothing will ever be okay.  He completely ignores the fire as he walks on, Hide’s body in his arms. He honestly surprised when nobody tries to stop him, and he steps over bodies of people who shouldn’t be dead because this whole thing was pointless.

Kaneki was just so ready to come home and this… this is what happened. He was destined to sufferer, maybe he should just kill himself and get it over with. Then he thinks about what Hide would think, he can hear his voice in his head telling him to keep going on.

Another voice that sounds exactly like Rize remind him in a sickeningly sweet voice that Hide is dead. “It doesn’t matter now Kaneki-kun. You should just give up already.”

“No.” He says quietly. There’s so many things… so many things he needs to make amends for, so many things to do...

_Beep… Beep…Beep…_

He isn’t surprised to see Arima, not that he actually knew who he was, but he had heard the rumors of the special class agent that smelled like death. He sits Hide’s body on the ground, unwillingly. He stands back up, as much he just wants to lay down next to Hide and let this man kill him he can’t.

At the very last has to take Hide’s body back to his mother. **HE** has to do it.

He meet Arima straight on unflinching, he hasn’t killed anybody here yet and he’s not going to start here. He doesn’t get that chance though. There is no pain, but he can feel something’s wrong. He falls to his knees no longer able to stand.

This night has taken everything out of him.

The world starts turning black around the edges.

This night has taken everything from him.

But for some reason, Kaneki decides as the world turns black, that it’s okay.

_Everything’s going to be okay…_

_Beep… Beep…Beep…_

When his eyes open the next time he’s lying on the bed in a white room. At first he thinks he’s dead, but then he hears the steady beeping of the heart monitor, and there’s an oxygen mask covering his face. He’s too weak to even lift his hands to take it off, so he just lays alone incapable of any movement.

It’s not long before a nurse enters the room staring  down at a clip board in her hands, Kaneki follows her movements with his eyes, tilting his head as she walks to check the vitals on the machine next to him. She turns and looks at him finally and she drops the clipboard and backs up a couple of steps her mouth opening and closing as if she’s trying to say something that won’t come out.

“Doctor!” She finally manages to get out as she bolts from the room. “Someone call the doctor!”

All Kaneki can do is watch her movements out of the room. He doesn’t understand how he got here, the last thing he remembers is… the last thing he remembers is… Hide. Something’s wrong with Hide, but what he can’t remember.

Panic gives him the strength to finally move but he doesn’t make it any further than the floor beside the bed before he collapses. The doctor comes hurrying in after he’s been sitting there for a while, the nurse that had been in there earlier close behind him.

“Kaneki-san, you shouldn’t be getting out of bed yet.” The doctor helps him back in to the bed, but the older man can sense his distress. “You’ve been in a coma for quite a long time; you need time for your body to recover.”

“…i…e.”

“Huh?”

“H…de…” Kaneki tries again getting more and more frustrated when not even his voice will follow his orders.

“I think he wants his friend. You know the blonde.”

The doctor nods, “Ah most likely, we have his number on file as Kaneki-san’s emergency contact, please call and tell him.” He turns to Kaneki as the nurse leaves the room, “That’s what you want, right? You’re friend? It must be scary waking up in your situation.”

Kaneki blinks at him unable to do much more, his body exhausted.

“I’m going to ask you a series of questions, blink once for yes twice for no. Do you understand?” Yes. “Do you know who you are?” Yes. “Very good. Do you know who you are because we told you?” No. “So you woke up knowing who you were?” Yes. “That’s very good. Do you remember what happened to you?” No. “Do you know what today is?” No. The questions go on and on for a while, until Kaneki feels like he can no longer keep his eyes open.

“Ken!” Hide comes bounding in the room suddenly and it’s like the sun has filled the room. He hesitates in the doorway as if he’s afraid that coming closer will make the whole situation break. If he takes a step toward Kaneki this will be just like all his other dreams that he’s had about this.

Kaneki’s eyes light up and he reaches out for him. “Hid….”

The blonde breaths out a breath that he didn’t know he’d been holding and is across the room holding him tightly, “I was so worried you were never going to wake up. You’ve been asleep for so long. I was so worried, but I knew you had to wake up eventually.” He keeps on rambling like this hot tears dripping down his face and onto Kaneki’s shoulder.

The doctor has to pull Hide off of him, but the blonde refuses to leave the room and they eventually give up on making him leave. Kaneki falls asleep to the sound of Hide rambling and the warmth of his hand in his own.

Hide’s still there when Kaneki wakes up again and his heart monitor picks up slightly and he mentally curses it. He’s glad that Hide’s asleep.

It takes a week before he’s properly able to talk again, and when he can he makes them check his rc levels repeatedly. It takes another week before they start letting him have “real” food, it’s mainly just jell-o and that’s when he finally accepts that he was still actually human. They finally let him look at himself in the mirror too, and he looks like himself.

It’s weird to see himself with black hair, hard to accept that none of it was real and that he was in a coma for over a year.

He starts physical therapy when they finally allow Hide to bring him the hamburger he’s been requesting since he could speak. He sleeps a lot still but Hide is always there when he can be. It makes his heart flutter, he’s never been more glad to have something be a nightmare. All the torture that Jason had put him through fades away like a bad dream, but he can still see Hide dying in front of him so clearly as if he’d actually been there. As if he’d lived through carrying his best friend’s dead body. Those nights when he wakes up from that dream he doesn’t go back to sleep, even with Hide right there, half draped over his bed sleep.

Hide has informed him of all the things that he’s missed, he hears the blonde complain about his job and classes. He can’t help but smile because these things are so, so ordinary. And while he’s told Hide bits and pieces of what he went through in his coma, he can never bring himself to tell him the whole story. Though he knows Hide knows there’s more to it than Kaneki will tell him, he never presses for an answer.

When he can walk again, albeit with some assistance he’s released from the hospital, and that’s when Hide finally tells him that he moved all of Kaneki’s stuff to storage because nobody had hope that he’d pull through.

“So where am I going to live?” He’s almost panicking.

“Well…” Hide looks off to the side as Kaneki stares into the small storage shed that holds his whole life packed in boxes. “I figured that… you know, could stay with me…”

“Huh?” Kaneki turns to him and wobbles slightly.

“Well you’re not exactly in any shape to actually live on your own yet, so you should just come live with me.”

“You want me to move in… with you?” Hide flushes slightly but grins at him and even though it’s snowing Kaneki feels slightly warmer.

“Something like that yeah. I figured that it would help you adjust to living in the real world again. Wait… why are you crying?”

_”Let’s go home…”_

Kaneki almost says the words, but they die in his throat. He licks his lips and nods wiping his tears away. “Okay, it sounds like a plan then.”

“Ken… why are you crying?” Hide reaches up and wipes the tears away himself and Kaneki can feel himself tremble.

“I… I had to watch you die… In my arms…. While… while…”Kaneki doesn’t even get the words out before he’s being wrapped in a hug.

“It’s okay, it’s okay. I’m right here, I’m not going to let anything bad happen to you again. So stop crying.”

Hide stands there holding him tightly until Kaneki calms down. He grabs a bag of what has to be Kaneki’s clothes and relocks the door. “Come on.” The blonde smiles at him and takes his hand.

Kaneki wants to blurt out that he loves him, but now isn’t the right time. Soon, but not right now, there’s still so much work that he has to do before that can happen. He will tell him though, before it’s too late. He can’t lose Hide again without letting him know, but he’s pretty sure that Hide already knows.

**Author's Note:**

> To clear up any confusion, he's been in a coma since the accident with Riza. He never received her organs and he never woke up.


End file.
